The year Canadians took back justice

In June, the morning after Vancouver’s Stanley Cup hockey riot, hundreds of residents returned to the city’s downtown core and helped clean up a mess made by drunken hooligans, looters and arsonists. Few have been published, but many have been shamed.

In the first of a week-long series about some of the most interesting ideas to emerge in the past year, the National Post’s Brian Hutchinson retraces how Canadians took back justice.

In June, the morning after Vancouver’s Stanley Cup hockey riot, hundreds of residents returned to the city’s downtown core and helped clean up a mess made by drunken hooligans, looters and arsonists. Politicians including B.C. Premier Christy Clark stepped around shards of glass on Granville Street, a crowded retail strip left in shambles the previous night. They shook their heads. The Premier seemed especially upset.

“Those people who were involved in this, we will catch you,” she told a throng of reporters. “We will punish the criminals to the full extent of the law…. We won’t surrender our streets to thugs and criminals. The province will use every avenue to ensure these criminals see jail.”

As the year ends, none of the perpetrators has been punished, at least not in the formal manner described by Premier Clark.

To date, only eight alleged rioters have made a first appearance in provincial court, and none has been convicted of any crime.

[np-related]

For a handful of others, however, justice came swiftly. They were the ones caught damaging and stealing property by camera-toting bystanders. Their images and identities were posted on public post-riot websites created overnight by computer-savvy citizens. They were publicly shamed. Most of the men and women who found themselves outed then turned to social media such as Facebook to offer apologies; these seemed to satisfy most onlookers. Anger was then directed at others less contrite.

The online crusades set a worrisome precedent, according to some legal analysts. “The mob mentality has moved into cyberspace for the first time,” University of British Columbia criminologist Christopher Schneider said. But others saw the emergence of a useful, legitimate tool. After the riots in “genteel Vancouver” and London, England, this summer, New York-based forensic psychiatrist Michael Welner pointed out that “publicizing the identities of looters amid a community rejection of looting humiliates the perpetrator. It creates a powerful disincentive where courts and justice cannot.”

Rioters and looters, he said, “have no respect for society or other faceless victims. But they are selfish enough to be sensitive to shaming themselves or their loved ones.”

Appropriate or not, citizen-led responses to illegal and unwelcome acts were widespread this year. We also witnessed the rise of the so-called Real Life Super Hero movement, with adults creating crime-fighter alter egos and taking to the streets in costume, looking for villains of all sorts, and for opportunities to help.

“I don’t want my daughter to be afraid to go downtown,” explained one fledgling superhero, based in Windsor, Ont. A telephone repairman by day, he transforms at night into Crimson Canuck and patrols his city’s streets. Crimson Canuck occasionally posts all-points bulletins on classified advertising sites, asking like-minded citizens to come forward and help out. “The Crimson Canuck is looking for those who wish to help Windsor as Real-Life Super Heroes,” reads one. “We would be helping by having weekly or bi-weekly meetings to organize monthly events that would benefit local charities and people on the street. Our first priority would be those who sleep outdoors. We can put together care packages, or buy them some essentials. Like new socks.”

Others promote more robust action. In Chilliwack, B.C., a group of costumed teenagers made a number of attempts this year to expose alleged Internet predators by luring them into public spaces on the premise of meeting underage girls. When the alleged predators showed up for their arranged “dates,” the masked crusaders pounced, shooting video of the alarmed suspects and peppering them with questions meant to humiliate.

Local police have tried to discourage the activity. “We do not condone vigilantism,” RCMP Corporal Tammy Hollingsworth said earlier this month, after the Chilliwack posse struck again. “We just want to continue to warn the public not to take the law into their own hands.”

But Canadians were also reminded of their own responsibilities — and given more power — in stopping criminals from evading the law. The federal government introduced legislation this year to “expand the circumstances” under which a person can make a citizen’s arrest, and to better protect people who defend themselves and their property from a criminal act.

Among the proposed changes to Section 494 of the Criminal Code is a provision for making citizen’s arrests “within a reasonable period of time after” crimes are observed. The Harper government deemed the change necessary after a notorious case in 2009, when Toronto shopkeeper David Chen and his cousin apprehended a thief who had robbed the store of some houseplants. The pair were charged with assault and confinement, not because they had mishandled the miscreant, but because they had arrested him an hour after his crime. Current law says a citizen’s arrest can only be made on the spot.

Toronto criminal lawyer Jonathan Dawe says the proposed legislation is too vague. “What is ‘a reasonable period of time’ after a crime?” he asks. “Could someone who thinks he saw a person steal then wait a week before making a citizen’s arrest? Members of the public will have to assess for themselves what is ‘reasonable.’ But they aren’t trained like police to make such assessments.” They might continue to expose themselves to charges of assault, he says, despite the proposed legislation’s intention.

Still, Mr. Dawe says it’s important to keep citizen’s arrest powers on the books. Private security guards depend on them all the time, he points out. And despite other trends in public justice this year, such as “name and shame” websites and the Real Life Super Hero movement, he doesn’t think Canadians are likely to start arresting each other en masse.

Neither does Dave Schroder, an Edmonton-based co-ordinator for the Guardian Angels, a volunteer citizen crime prevention group with chapters in 14 countries, and in cities across Western Canada. Mr. Schroder has patrolled Edmonton streets since 2007. While he has broken up numerous fights and has helped victims of crime, he has never made a citizen’s arrest. He carries a pair of handcuffs with him, just in case.

“As people committed to public safety, we can contribute a lot, and in different ways,” he says. Citizen justice “isn’t about kicking butt and cracking heads. We’re not trying to be heroes, because that approach doesn’t work. Just being visible in areas and in situations where crimes are often committed is useful. We always bring a video camera when we’re on patrol, so we can collect good evidence that way. The police can’t be everywhere,” Mr. Schroder says, “which is why we get out there and get involved. When we do see a crime in progress, that’s who we call — the police.”